Architecture & Design for Autism

It’s a mistake to think that cognition and cognitive deficits cause behaviour. We react to our circumstances: we all react poorly to environments that are aversive – the sound of scratching on a chalkboard, the smell of fumes or strobing lights. People with autism are more sensitive than most. We recognise this and design for sensitivities that even we cannot perceive.

Autism is a diagnosis based on problems with interpersonal communication and restricted behaviours that are first observed in childhood. It is considered a developmental disorder and as such, isn’t treatable. But as anyone who knows someone with autism (or even someone on the broader autistic spectrum) will attest, people with autistic conditions have very strong reactions to physical environments. This means that careful and informed design can help manage the fears, desires and demands that otherwise wind up people with autism, exacerbating interpersonal difficulties.

We like to understand as a divergence from normal experience that is caused by an inability to experience social and physical environments and the things they contain in the normative way, and for this reason, people with autism react and behave in ways that others find challenging. But design is able to mediate this behaviour because it’s always tied to specific objects, places and people. To understand the dynamic of autism and architecture design, it is more important to go to the place where behaviour occurs than it is to “look inside someone’s head.”

In designing architecture for autism, there are a couple of theoretical approaches that architects take. The first (and most common) is to design environments as if they were not problematic in the hope that the reactions people with autism have will eventually normalise. Our approach is different. We want to match the environment to the needs of the person with autism, so they can find mental respite and build resilience for when they go out. This approach means that family and carers are likely to have an easier time, thereby settling the anxieties that naturally take root in the social context also.